


Backward, Forward, Onward

by Tor_Raptor



Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Avengers: Endgame (Movie), Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Canon Compliant, Canonical Character Death, Gen, Grief/Mourning, Onward (2020) Spoilers, Post-Avengers: Endgame (Movie)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-29
Updated: 2020-04-29
Packaged: 2021-03-01 18:07:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,505
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23911306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tor_Raptor/pseuds/Tor_Raptor
Summary: Tony Stark and Peter Parker each watch Pixar’s Onward at a tumultuous point in their lives. And they both think about each other.
Relationships: Ned Leeds & Peter Parker, Peter Parker & Tony Stark
Comments: 4
Kudos: 29





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So I've watched Endgame twice since quarantine began and recently watched Disney Pixar's Onward, and I now I just have a lot of feelings that need to go somewhere. So I channeled them into this little fic. The main characters in Onward are voiced by Tom Holland and Chris Pratt, so I had a little fun playing with that concept. Hope you enjoy this sad little drabble.

It took years, but the world eventually got back on its feet after losing half of its population to the most horrific dust storm since the Dirty Thirties. The Starks considered themselves pretty lucky, all things considered. They could have lost so much more, Pepper especially. The first three weeks after the Decimation overwhelmed her with an anguish she hadn't experienced since Tony went missing in Afghanistan. Over the course of those despair-wrought three months, more and more people had gradually given up and presumed him dead. Only Colonel Rhodes had continued to search tirelessly. And thank God he did.

At the compound while waiting for Captain Danvers to return from her rescue mission to space, Pepper sat among the other Avengers and couldn't help but imagine the loathing she would feel for them if they discovered Tony hadn't been among the fifty percent to survive. But fate, or random chance, or Thanos—whatever force it was—decided not to punish her with that grief. Not yet.

But the Tony that returned to her wasn't the same as the one who had abandoned their walk in the park to chase after that stupid spaceship. His demeanor reminded her of right after the attack on New York City and the wormhole incident. The nightmares about that event had haunted him for years, and she suspected he brought with him new ones about whatever he'd witnessed up there.

"I lost the kid," he'd told Captain Rogers, eyes hollow and desperate from three weeks of guilt and starvation. That look remained, even after he built his physical strength back up. It never wavered, never granted him any reprieve, except on two occasions. The first on their wedding day, where he managed to keep up good spirits despite the fact that his meager group of groomsmen conspicuously lacked one young member. And the second when she told him she was pregnant. For the briefest instant his eyes lit up with genuine happiness and excitement…and then a cloud of something bitter crept in slowly and soured his joy.

Only after Morgan's birth did Pepper notice apparent improvement. Their daughter gave Tony a purpose again, someone to look after as one of his own, a distraction from what he considered the ultimate failure of his life. The number of good days steadily grew over time, accompanied by a steady decrease in the nightmare-riddled nights and occasional sobbing breakdowns that Tony tried and failed to hide from her attention. By the fourth year post-Decimation, the bad days occurred so seldom that Pepper dared to hope Tony stopped blaming himself, that he'd well and truly moved on as Captain Rogers encouraged his support groups. Pepper had once recruited Happy to attend one on her behalf, hoping he might learn something that could help her help Tony. But nothing she'd done had any effect positive or negative; he'd just needed time.

By the time Morgan turned three, Pepper let her guard down in regards to Tony and the black moods that had plagued him before Morgan came along. She mistakenly thought they were in the clear. But the last thing she expected to send Tony spiraling was a kids' movie that Morgan chose one Friday night.

It wasn't even a particularly new movie, released less than two years after the Decimation, when the world had still desperately needed the extra doses of positivity and sweetness that animation studios could provide. Pepper didn't know where Morgan heard about it, but she'd been begging all week and they weren't about to deny her such a simple request. That evening after dinner, they gathered the softest blankets in the house and curled up on the couch, Morgan sandwiched between her parents though leaning slightly towards Tony as she usually did. Pepper couldn't find it within herself to be jealous that her husband was obviously the favorite parent. Tony tried so hard to be everything his own father never was, and Tony succeeded at everything he tried.

Once they were settled, Morgan called eagerly, "Friday, play Onward!" She adored the 'magic voice in the walls' that Tony talked to whenever he worked on a project. She also adored sneaking into the garage to discover his latest builds, and had defeated every supposedly childproof lock they put on the door. Pepper knew, despite Morgan's young age, that she inherited her father's intelligence.

The opening sequence elapsed without incident. Pepper mostly paid attention to Morgan's reaction as all sort of magical creatures walked, galloped, and flew across the screen. "Unicorns!" Morgan excitedly, pointing out the beautiful white horned horses. Then the sequence concluded, bringing the story into modern times, and another, distinctly dirtier, unicorn munched from a garbage bin. "Why is he eating trash like Rocket?" Morgan asked, tugging at her father's sleeve.

"I don't know, maybe that's just what he likes to eat," Tony responded. Morgan seemingly accepted this answer and turned her attention back to the screen. The domestic bliss lasted approximately sixty seconds more before things took an unexpected turn. The main character, a scrawny blue elf with pointed ears, had barely spoken a single word when Pepper heard a strangled gasp from the other side of the couch. She glanced at Tony, the source of the noise, and the utter look of shock on his face confused her. Once the character had spoken a full sentence, it morphed from shock into the distant, haunted look Pepper had falsely hoped she'd never see again.

She wanted to ask him what was wrong, but Morgan sat between them and Pepper didn't want to alarm her. Morgan was too young to remember how Tony had acted towards the beginning, how long and arduous the transition from raging grief to acceptance had been. On days the clouds refused to clear, he'd always taken a backseat when it came to parenting, unwilling to taint his innocent daughter with the pain and hardship of his past. The Tony that Morgan knew now was invincible, infallible, and incredible, as much a superhero to her as he was to the rest of the world that knew Iron Man.

Tony endured only a minute more before he forcibly excused himself. "I'm sorry, I can't do this," he muttered, picking himself up off the couch and striding off.

"Daddy, where are you going?" Morgan pleaded, scrambling forward to stand and follow him. Pepper placed a gentle hand on her should and stopped her.

"It's okay. I'm gonna go talk to Daddy and see what's going on, okay? You just stay here and keep watching."

"But it won't be as fun without you."

"I know. But I'll be back soon," she promised.

"What about Daddy?"

"We'll see."

Before Morgan could protest the vague response, Pepper set off after Tony, worry starting to creep up her spine like a spider. She found him in the garage fidgeting with a screwdriver, that _look_ Pepper hadn't seen in months deepening the lines of his face. "Tony, what happened?" she asked sternly but calmly, a tone that had always worked in the past to get him to talk through these moments.

"I—I don't know," he admitted with a shake of his head. "Maybe I'm going crazy, but that kid—the protagonist or whatever—he sounded just like _him_."

"Like who?"

"Like _him_ ," Tony repeated. Pepper understood; only one _him_ ever sent Tony into a state like this. But she'd heard Peter Parker's voice before and hadn't noticed such a strong resemblance in the little blue teenager. Had she misheard, or was Tony simply projecting the memory of the kid's voice onto this animated character?

"Are—are you sure?" she asked, unsure how to respond to that statement.

"I know what I heard."

"Okay. I believe you. But is running away from it really the best thing, Tony? I know thinking about him is painful for you, but allowing this to scare you off will just reinforce that negativity."

"Pepper, there is nothing but reinforced negativity," he sighed.

"That's a lie, and you know it. You can't pretend his entire existence was a bad thing."

"No, of course it's not! The only bad thing—the _worst_ thing—is the end of that existence."

"You're right. That is the worst thing. But Tony, forgetting won't make it any better. He deserves not to be forgotten."

"You think I could ever forget? Pep, he _died_ in my arms and I could do _nothing_ but watch."

"Yes, that's the part you can't forget. But there is so much more than that, Tony, _so much more_. And I can't think of a better reminder than watching this little blue guy who sounds just like him go on a fun adventure and learn some life lessons."

"But he—he'll never get to," Tony sighed despondently.

"I know." Pepper stepped forward and embraced him, putting the screwdriver back on the table. "But you can't only think about the "never"s; you can still think fondly about the "one time"s that made you both happy."

"Okay," he choked out, now properly returning Pepper's hug instead of passively enduring it. "I can do that."

"Good." She guided him out the workshop and back to Morgan, who sat patiently watching a frozen screen.

"You're back!" she exclaimed. "I had Friday pause it while you were gone so you wouldn't miss anything."

"That was very thoughtful of you," Pepper complimented.

"Friday, they're back, you can play it again!"

The movie started back up again and Pepper allowed herself to enjoy the heartwarming story of these two brothers and their magical quest. About halfway through, she glanced at Tony and for a moment thought he'd fallen asleep. Then a particular line brought a crooked smile to his face and she recognized he was merely listening with his eyes closed and imagining a pleasant "one time."

~0~

That was the first and only time Pepper watched that movie. Nowadays, any story about fatherless children reminded her of too many "never"s.


	2. Chapter 2

At least according to Ned, one of the greatest tragedies of being formally dead for five years was the sheer number of movies they'd missed out on. Peter rather considered other aspects of his life to be far more tragic, but he couldn't bring himself to dampen Ned's enthusiasm by bringing up…certain things. Besides, watching the seemingly endless list of must-sees that Ned had cobbled together by relentlessly interrogating people who hadn't been Decimated helped to keep his mind off of those certain things.

For the past two weekends they'd been working through Pixar. Peter would deny that he cried during several of them, and Ned would corroborate because he was just a good friend like that. The fact of the matter was his emotions had been a lot more volatile since coming back, and Pixar had mastered the magic formula to kick his tear ducts into gear.

"What are we watching today?" Peter asked. He'd arrived at Ned's house just after noon on Saturday, exhausted from a week of school and Spiderman and eager to turn his brain off for a few hours.

"Umm…it's called Onward," he said, reading off his list. "It came out two years after the Decimation."

"Cool. What's it about?"

"I don't like to set expectations for myself when it comes to kids' movies. It's for kids, so I'm guessing family or magic. Or some combination of the two."

"Sounds good."

Ned started up the movie and within the first two minutes it was evident the magic part of his prediction had been correct. And by five minutes the family part proved true also.

"Disney does it again," Ned remarked.

"Hey, they have a formula and it works," Peter reminded him.

"Still wouldn't kill them to do something original for once."

"Give it a chance. The idea of technology being preferable over magic is certainly new. Usually it's a one-or-the-other kinda deal."

"Well you would know. You've seen and even used some of the coolest tech in the world _and_ witnessed magic in action."

"Yeah, I guess you're right." Peter didn't really like to think about magic and technology too much. The combination of the two had completely turned his life upside down, shaken it around, and spit it back out again in what felt like no time at all to him. They watched for about ten minutes in silence, the whole time Peter's heart quivering in sympathy for this young elf who grew up fatherless. Peter knew more than anyone what it was like to lose a father figure. He'd gone through three before even reaching adulthood. God that sounded so morbid. One shouldn't 'go through' father figures like one wears through a pair of sneakers.

"Dude, this Ian guy kinda sounds like you," Ned said, tearing Peter away from his horrible thoughts.

Peter had been listening to the guy talk and didn't really hear the resemblance. "Your voice sounds different to other people, so maybe I just can't hear it," he said.

"It's kinda creepy how similar it is. You really don't hear it?"

"No, I really don't." However, the older brother's voice did bear a strong resemblance to the man from Earth that held a blaster to Peter's head while they were in space. Weird.

As soon as Barley described his lack-of-goodbye to their dying father, Peter felt sick to his stomach. He understood that terror, of watching the man you looked up to suffer to the point where he didn't even look like himself anymore. He'd been unable to do anything but blubber and apologize—for what, he wasn't even entirely sure—until Pepper Potts pulled him away and held herself together to say exactly what Mr. Stark needed to hear. In that moment, Peter hated himself for his ineptitude, his inability to put his own selfishness aside and be a reassuring presence instead of a distressing one.

"Man, are you okay?" Ned asked concernedly. Only then did Peter realize he'd been silently crying for a long time.

"Yeah," he sniffled, wiping his damp cheeks with the sleeve of his sweatshirt. He considered leaving it at that, but Ned deserved to know more after all they'd been through together. He admitted, "It's just a touchy subject, losing fathers."

"I didn't even think about that. I'm so sorry, should I turn it off? We can totally watch something else."

"No, it's okay. I want to see how it ends."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah. Just don't judge me if I'm a blubbering mess by the time the credits roll."

"Of course not. You didn't judge me for sobbing after Coco."

"We both sobbed after Coco," Peter reminded him.

"Yeah, but I sobbed harder. And way louder."

"Okay, maybe you did."

"You bet I did."

"What would MJ think if she could see us crying like babies over kids' movies?"

"She'd commend us for not maintaining a forced façade of masculinity," Ned stated.

"Yeah. That sounds about right. Maybe next time we do this we should invite her."

"Sounds like a plan."


End file.
